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How to conduct Expert Interviews (consulting skills) - YouTube
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- Hello everyone.
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So my wife and I are currently
enjoying a weekend stroll,
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here from Munich.
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We are on our way to our
favorite ice cream place
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here in our neighborhood,
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right now we're walking through
an urban gardening project
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that is around us as well.
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So yeah, just stick in
here with me for a second
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and then we will start
with this week's new video.
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(melodious rhythm music)
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- So here's some zucchini.
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Then you can see some fresh kale.
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And if you want some rhubarb
cake, here is some rhubarb.
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- There is one thing
that you will for sure do
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very frequently in consulting
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and this is conducting expert interviews.
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So on different types of projects,
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it will be necessary for you
to tap into expertise of people
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who have a lot of experience
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in a specific industry or function,
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to get that knowledge
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and consolidate that into insights
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for your clients.
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So welcome to another video here
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on my channel Firm Learning.
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My name is Heinrich and on
my channel I want to help you
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to become successful in the
first years of your career.
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Today, we are going to do
this video in three parts.
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First, I'm going to talk about
what expert interviews are,
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what the contexts are
in which you need them.
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Second, I'm going to share a
couple of very insightful tips
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on how to conduct them
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and also how to find the
expert that you might need.
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And third,
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I'm going to show you a tool
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that you could do to do exactly that
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because this video is
sponsored by Inex One.
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It's a platform where you can source
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expert interview partners.
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So let's get into it. I trust
it's going to be interesting.
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Let's start
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by talking about why you
even need expert interviews
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in professional services.
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Shouldn't a consulting team already know
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all the things by themself?
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Well, of course,
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it is usually the case that
on a consulting project team,
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there will be consultants, project leads,
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and, of course, especially,
also partners staffed on that
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that will have deep industry
and function expertise
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and will be able to
contribute significantly
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to the project's success.
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Though what's also true is that you,
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in general, do not just want
to base your recommendations
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based on the insights of
1 or 2 or 3 people or so,
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but as a general best practice
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to tap into knowledge of other
industry experts as well,
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ensuring that every person
who knows something valuable
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can be staffed on a given project.
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But this is not only true for consulting.
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Another sector that also
very frequently relies
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on expert interviews is private equity.
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So private equity is the
type of firms that purchase
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other firms with the hope
to in a couple of years,
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sell them for an even higher price.
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And what these companies,
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these private equity companies need to do,
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is when they look for targets
to potentially acquire,
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they need to have a very,
very solid understanding
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of that company's industry,
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of that company's market position.
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So what they do
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is something that is called
a commercial due diligence.
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They look into the
company's business model,
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they look into how the company
is currently positioned,
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how the market looks like.
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And here, again,
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surely they don't know all
of this for themselves,
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but very frequently,
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they tap into expert interviews.
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They reach out to industry experts,
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people who really know the industry well,
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to get their insights
and better understand
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how the company is currently structured,
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what their value proposition is,
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and whether it might
be a worthwhile company
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to acquire indeed.
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Now let's look into
some tips and insights,
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what you can do
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to conduct a successful expert interview.
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And the first question is:
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What people should you actually
talk to for your project?
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And, of course, it will
depend on the specific project
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that you're working on.
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I will now focus
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on due diligence type of projects,
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but this is applicable to
many other situations as well.
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So in these projects
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I like to speak to three
different type of experts.
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The first is former C-suite
people or former sales directors
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of direct competitors of the company
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that you are actually interested in.
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If you talk to people
who worked at competitors
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of that company,
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they will likely understand
the market very well.
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Especially the C-level people
often have an overall view
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on the whole market.
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And similar things are true
for the sales directors.
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Next will be former procurement directors
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of companies that would be
customers of the company
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that you would be interested in.
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And the reason is that
these procurement directors,
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they will be the people that
will buy from the company
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that you're looking into.
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So these people will very well understand
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what the buying criteria are
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and how the offering of this
specific company differentiates
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itself from maybe offerings
of some of their competitors.
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When now you can understand
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what the relative position
of strength of the company is
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or maybe also some weaknesses
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that the offering of this company has.
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Last but not least,
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you will want to talk to
C-level people of companies
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in the supply chain of the company
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that you're interested in.
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So both the tier one and
the tier two suppliers
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of that company,
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just to get a better feeling
of how the company is perceived
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by its biggest supplier partners.
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Another question is: How
should you approach them?
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What questions should
you ask these people?
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And here, two tips I'd like to share:
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The first is, what's always key,
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is to have the end product in mind, right?
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So with the results of that interview,
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what do you wanna do with that?
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What do you need to create based on that?
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And in these types of projects
and these due diligences,
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often it's a slide deck.
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It's a document that you create
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that you will then later work with.
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So what's always super
beneficial for this exercise,
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but also for many other similar tasks,
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is to already have an outline
of that document ready.
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Make sure that you have
prepared a straw man
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of the document,
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because then you exactly know
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what the pages are that you want to fill.
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Ideally,
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you also what the structure of these pages
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are supposed to be.
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Because then you can in a
very targeted way collect
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the information that you need
to fill all of these pages.
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And if you want to learn
more about how to create
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such a straw man,
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I will link a video above here
that discuss this in detail.
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So check it out.
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Now, my second tip is about the questions
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that you are supposed to
ask in these interviews.
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And now I can talk a lot
about very specific questions
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that you should ask.
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What I actually did as a service to you is
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that I created a list
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of the most relevant questions
for these expert interviews
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that you can very well ask
these different types of people
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that we just talked about.
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I compiled these questions in
a questionnaire cheat sheet,
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which I would assume will be quite helpful
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if you are planning to
conduct expert interviews
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in the future.
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So you can find a link to
exactly this questionnaire
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in the video description.
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So check out the link
in the video description
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to download it.
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Now let's look into some behavioral tips,
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what you can do to make the
most out of your interview.
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And now we'll skip all the
general interview tips and tricks
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because I already created a
video about that in the past.
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I will link it somewhere above here.
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I just wanna make two
very specific remarks.
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And the first is to be
empathetic with the interviewee,
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given that for many of these people,
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especially if they are external experts,
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for many of them it might
likely be the first time
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they conduct such an interview.
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So understand that for them
it's a rather new thing.
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Maybe they are nervous.
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Maybe they are a bit unsure
how to behave, what to say.
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So be empathetic with that
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and make sure that in the beginning
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you create a comfortable
conversation environment
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where these people can slowly break up
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and then talk to you and
share their knowledge.
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My second advice comes
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from working with some junior consultants
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who sometimes conducted
these interviews as well.
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And what I've often seen
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is that some of these
people are like very strict
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from the beginning,
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asking super detailed
number-oriented questions
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in the couple of very first sentences.
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This often is a bit difficult.
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It can often feel intimidating
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and can feel like putting
the person in a corner.
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So you will lean from my
experience what works better
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to create just this open environment,
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is rather starting with
some more general, wide,
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open-ended questions
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where the person can
slowly get going sharing
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some information with you.
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This will often be done easier.
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And also the likelihood is higher
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that you really get the
information that you want
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if you give the person some time
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to ease into the conversation.
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Now, I hope you are convinced of the value
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of expert interviews,
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but now you might ask
yourself the question,
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"Where do I even get these experts from?
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How do I find people that I can talk to
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for these purchases?"
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And usually in these
firms you have two sources
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that you can tap into.
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The first is internal experts
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and the second is external experts.
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So let's start with the,
probably, easier one,
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the internal experts.
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So, usually, in your network,
in the consulting firm,
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you will find people who might be able
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to contribute something
to that specific topic.
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You also might be able to
just write an email newsletter
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to the interest group of people working
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in that specific industry
or function practice,
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to find another senior project lead,
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another partner who has worked
in this specific industry
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and has a lot of things to
share that you can reach out to.
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But in many cases, the internal
experts will not be enough.
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And indeed also, depending
on the firm you work for,
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maybe your internal network
of people with expertise
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in a specific topic is not even that vast.
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So here you need to reach
out to external people,
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not working for your firm.
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So how do you do that?
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And here, thank God, something
like expert networks exist.
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They are different service
providers out there
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that you can reach out to,
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and they will be able to
come up with a list of people
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with a background in a specific industry.
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Often even people who have
worked in a very specific company
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that you can target.
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These are people that signed up
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for a specific expert network.
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They'll let this network know
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that they would be open to
conduct such an interview.
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Of course, it would cost
something. It's not for free.
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But then via these networks,
you can find these people.
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Of course, I hope from what I've said,
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the issue with using these expert networks
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already became clear.
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And this is that it's
not really guaranteed
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that only because you talk
to one specific network,
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you really find the best profile
that you're interested in.
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And because there are
different service providers,
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often you end up talking to
lots of different parties.
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They all have a slightly
different process.
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They send you lists of
potential candidates.
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It's a back and forth of many
different service providers.
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I know this from experience,
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having handled this in the
past, a lot as an associate.
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And this is where Inex
One comes into play.
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It's a service provider that aggregates
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all the different expert
networks out there.
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It was founded by another
former McKinsey consultant.
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So let me show you what it's
all about and how it works.
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So let's look into how you
could do that with Inex One.
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So this is the webpage
of them that you see.
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So you see here, The
Expert Network Marketplace.
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I will link it also in
the video description
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if you are interested in it.
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You'll see that their services are focused
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on firms like consulting,
private equity, and so on,
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but certainly you can also
use it for your own projects.
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And what I think is pretty cool is
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that access to the platform
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and working with it is
completely free of charge.
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It is only once you really sign up
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and then conduct expert calls,
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that they charge you for it.
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So in case this is of interest,
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just sign up and check it out, I guess.
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Now here to the platform itself.
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How it works is that you can
just create a new project
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where you're write into
what it's all about,
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some descriptions, what
you're interested in,
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when you want to conduct the interview,
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what geography the person is
supposed to be in and so on.
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So you can really fill
in all the information
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that is important to you.
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Then once you filled it all
out, you click Continue.
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Then you can choose
from the expert networks
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that they prioritized based on your input,
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that you can select.
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Then you press Publish.
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And then a new project is created where
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now people can apply.
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And they also have an interface
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where then people submit
their information, their CVs,
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and then you can really
schedule the interviews
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with the people you want.
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Here are some examples of ongoing projects
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where there are people
that you already talked to.
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Here the experts that you
might already have talked to.
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You see the fees, how expensive they are,
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then just schedule them,
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and then this is just what you need to do.
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So when I first saw this
I was quite impressed
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just because I remembered how
painful this whole process
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of interacting with
the different agencies,
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selecting the experts,
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and deciding and
scheduling the interviews,
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how painful this all was.
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So if you're interested in something,
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if this is something that
you need to do as well,
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I encourage you to just
check Inex One out.
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Again, signing up is free of charge.
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And then see whether this
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is a solution that works for you as well.
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I'm sure that I'm not the only one
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here in the Firm Learning community
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with expertise in conducting
expert interviews.
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So I'd love to hear about
your insights as well.
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Do you have any tips to share?
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Please leave them in the comment section
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for the benefit of everyone
watching this channel.
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And as always,
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if you took any value out of
watching this video at all,
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please hit the like button
for the YouTube algorithm,
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and also subscribe to this
channel to stay up-to-date
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on all my content.
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My name is Heinrich.
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You also can find me on other platforms,
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such as Instagram, TikTok,
Twitch or LinkedIn.
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I will leave links to
the socials here below
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in the video description.
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In the video description
you will also find
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the download link to the cheat sheet
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with all the questions
that I talked about.
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Big thank you also
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to the sponsor of this
week's video, Inex One.
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If you want to learn more about them
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and test their platform,
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link to their platform is
in the video description
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and last but not all,
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a big thanks to all the
members of the channel.
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You're really helping me.
Thank you so much for that.
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And my name is Heinrich.
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I'm releasing new videos
every single Saturday.
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So see you again next
week. Until then, bye bye.
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